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Post by Airy W on Nov 2, 2016 11:43:36 GMT -6
A collision only happens if two ships have their centers occupy pretty much the same spot. The ship graphics can be on top of each other without collision. Is this because the ships are magnified for visibility or is this because there is no hitscan?
Also, did ships still have rams in the early 1900s? I know they weren't used to great effect but given how hard it is to hit the broad side of a barn in 1900 I wonder if it was still a viable strategy.
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Post by ccip on Nov 2, 2016 12:06:41 GMT -6
Yeah, I believe you're right - the sizes get exaggerated and I don't think there's a setting to change those. It doesn't actually make a difference since the hit probabilities and formations are still calculated based on real size. I think this was done mostly so you could see the action more clearly. Also, did ships still have rams in the early 1900s? I know they weren't used to great effect but given how hard it is to hit the broad side of a barn in 1900 I wonder if it was still a viable strategy. Rams were in and out of fashion periodically; they were massively popularized for a while after the 1866 Battle of Lissa where ramming was deliberately used by both sides and thought to have been decisive for the Austrians. In 1893, ironically, it was the accidental ramming and loss HMS Victoria that reinvigorated that fashion again, although the Camperdown who rammed her was also very severely damaged. By 1900 there were still ships being built with rams, but they were slowly falling out of fashion again. The French, who were big proponents of very large rams before, gave them up by 1900 and others were following. But there were still lots of ships built before that with rams which were in service, sort of like your legacy fleet. For the most part, really, they were taken off to save weight and streamline the hull. And, just because rams were largely gone, it didn't mean ramming was over. In fact, as it turned out, rams didn't really make ramming all that much more effective. In the game, you see ships overlap/get tangled up, because from what I've seen, friendly ships are prevented from colliding (presumably because the AI isn't precise enough to avoid a higher-than-average rate of collisions), but ships from opposite sides can ram each other. I am not sure how intentionally they do that, though.
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Post by Airy W on Nov 2, 2016 12:22:34 GMT -6
Thanks. One more question, did rams protect the ramming ship from damage?
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Post by ccip on Nov 2, 2016 12:53:43 GMT -6
Thanks. One more question, did rams protect the ramming ship from damage? In theory, yes - but in practice, doesn't seem to have been the case, at least in this period - the ships themselves were just so big and (relatively) fast that damage was mostly inflicted by the sheer mass and momentum. The incident I mentioned where HMS Victoria was accidentally rammed and sunk - HMS Camperdown, which sank her, was also severely damaged and nearly sank. As far as I understand, the ram actually made it worse because it was impossible to seal leaks coming through the ram itself. Structurally, the ram may have also weakened the ship overall (a more complex, less robust form than just a simple straight). And this, by the way, was a collision where even at the start of the turn, both ships were going at about 8kt, so at higher speeds it would be even more damaging. Experience showed that ramming was just too unpredictable and risky to rely on as a primary tactic, and then gunnery made it mostly pointless anyway.
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Post by axe99 on Nov 2, 2016 14:45:27 GMT -6
And, just because rams were largely gone, it didn't mean ramming was over. In fact, as it turned out, rams didn't really make ramming all that much more effective. In the game, you see ships overlap/get tangled up, because from what I've seen, friendly ships are prevented from colliding (presumably because the AI isn't precise enough to avoid a higher-than-average rate of collisions), but ships from opposite sides can ram each other. I am not sure how intentionally they do that, though. I'm fairly sure I've had one (and just one) instance of friendly ramming in 300+ hours of RTW, so I think it is possible (just really, really unlikely - and I play with large fleets and like destroyers and CLs, so there are usually plenty of opportunities!)
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Post by ccip on Nov 2, 2016 15:16:44 GMT -6
And, just because rams were largely gone, it didn't mean ramming was over. In fact, as it turned out, rams didn't really make ramming all that much more effective. In the game, you see ships overlap/get tangled up, because from what I've seen, friendly ships are prevented from colliding (presumably because the AI isn't precise enough to avoid a higher-than-average rate of collisions), but ships from opposite sides can ram each other. I am not sure how intentionally they do that, though. I'm fairly sure I've had one (and just one) instance of friendly ramming in 300+ hours of RTW, so I think it is possible (just really, really unlikely - and I play with large fleets and like destroyers and CLs, so there are usually plenty of opportunities!) Really! That is interesting then I should mention too that I've found collision mechanics pretty inconsistent in RTW - I'm not sure how it calculates damage from these "encounters", but I've seen everything from no damage inflicted at all to instant ship sinking. I'm sure tonnage differences and angles between ships factor into it, just seems to be a little clunky. Maybe it's just my own experience, but even in SAI I had far more consistent luck with ramming (mainly by cruisers vs. destroyers, or damaged battleships vs. damaged battleships). Not that I mind much though, because unless Variable Tech threw out something really extreme where guns became highly useless (which I doubt is even possible), even early in the game it's not worth trying to intentionally create ramming situations. As in the real world, in virtually any kind of encounter, you're much more likely to succeed with any other weapon on your ship besides the ram, and at much lower risk. Anyway, rams in the profile pictures and ship outlines are purely cosmetic in RTW. There's no difference from the game's perspective, and as far as I've been able to tell all the damage inflicted by ramming/collisions in combat goes right to the overall flooding/structure bars rather than any specific component of a ship.
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Post by director on Nov 2, 2016 15:43:51 GMT -6
A lot of those big rams were actually for buoyancy, not for ramming per se. French designers liked sharp bows for speed and also liked to put the gun turrets far forward, and the solution for that was a big bulbous protrusion under the waterline forward. Nowadays, ships have bulbous bows for efficient steaming at high speeds.
As far as I know, the last fleet action decided by ramming was Lissa, and Tegetthoff said he wouldn't have adopted the tactic if his ships had had better guns - again, it was a tactic of desperation, and it sort-of-worked because the Italian Admiral Persino incompetently mismanaged his fleet.
A big battleship (800 feet in length or so) cruising at 20 knots will travel its own length in less than 30 seconds (that's a fast off-the-cuff calc; take with a grain of salt). Warships aren't powerboats; even destroyers are manueverable only in contrast to the big ships. There were very few ramming incidents in the close-quarters night actions in the Pacific in WW2, and only HMS Glowworm's ramming Admiral Hipper comes to mind in the Atlantic. THat last says a lot for the bravery and guts (and desperation) of the British crew, but it also says something about low visibility and a German captain who didn't manage his battle very well.
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Post by ccip on Nov 2, 2016 20:18:23 GMT -6
Yes, the French sure did have a knack for some monstrous bows for a while!
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Post by galagagalaxian on Nov 2, 2016 20:58:14 GMT -6
Nevermind the bow, how many calibers are those gun barrels?! They seem really long.
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Post by ccip on Nov 2, 2016 22:02:47 GMT -6
Nevermind the bow, how many calibers are those gun barrels?! They seem really long. Only 40 calibers, actually! It's not the guns that are long, it's just turrets that were really cramped and small by comparison, making the guns look big
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Post by marcorossolini on Nov 3, 2016 3:51:32 GMT -6
Nevermind the bow, how many calibers are those gun barrels?! They seem really long. Only 40 calibers, actually! It's not the guns that are long, it's just turrets that were really cramped and small by comparison, making the guns look big Your comment caused me to look at those diagrams again. Blimey, you're getting into T-72 levels of cramped turrets in comparison.
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Post by jwsmith26 on Nov 3, 2016 10:36:45 GMT -6
I've seen probably 40 or 50 collisions in the games I've played. They typically occur in night scenarios when there is a massive melee in action. I've even seen a collision on the very first turn of a mission when an enemy ship spawned almost on top of one of mine and then immediately collided with my ship on turn one.
I have also seen friendly ship collisions. I play in rear admiral mode and when you issue direct orders your ships will do exactly as you order (at least the lead ship of the division) which can lead to friendly ship collisions if you're too careless with your orders. That seems realistic to me. There have been many more friendly ship collisions than instances of enemy rammings.
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Post by andyhall on Nov 3, 2016 13:56:07 GMT -6
The "exaggeration" of ship size on the map display varies, but it seems to be between 2x and 3x. It looks odd when their silhouettes overlap, but most of the time in real life those would be close calls rather than grinding steel.
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Post by jwsmith26 on Nov 3, 2016 17:14:49 GMT -6
You'll definitely know if ships collide. Both ships come to a screeching halt and remain intertwined for typically about 30 minutes, though some can disentangle themselves in a few minutes. Usually the smaller ship comes out far worse, often sinking. It can be very frustrating when they get stuck in such a manner that one of the ships can fire at the other. That can result in dozens of hits per turn as the ship bangs away at pointblank range.
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Post by HolyDragoon on Nov 5, 2016 16:52:12 GMT -6
Torpedoes may also be fired, IIRC. Had one of my ships ram another and it ended up lobbing a fish as well.
Don't think it was a great idea, but I guess self-damage isn't a thing.
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